They play almost every day (except Friday) on the 7-day cruises and last week the jackpot was won midweek and another jackpot on Thursday. We did not play this time but there are card packs you can buy for different prices. You can buy as many cards as you want and they usually play 4 or 5 games at a session. I will check my Navigators from last week and see if the prices are listed.

They also have raffles during each session for things like spa stuff, Castaway Cay rentals, jewelry, etc.

We played for the first time last week, but only on Thursday, the last sea day so I can only tell you how it was for that day. They have two types of "packs" you can buy. A family pack is $35 or what they call a Kiddie pack for $20. There are 5 games played at a seating and the payout is based on how many people play and how much money there is. The $20 pack gets you 15 color coded cards, 3 blue, 3 green, 3 yellow, 3 orange and 3 red. Each color corresponds to a game. The $35 pack gets you 6 cards per game. Those are your only choices. Also, they don't let you split the cards up per game so the 6 cards are all together and you have to keep them together.

I don't remember the payouts for the first four games, but the jackpot payout on the last game was around $2,100 and it was split three ways.

Children can play, but the parent has to make the claim. We only played on the last day, when the jackpot was the biggest. My DH won the jackpot with 2 others. We ended up with about $1,900 a piece--tax free money in cash!!

I told my husband when he said that he wanted to play, that it was a waste of $35---boy was I wrong!

Thanks for the information. My kids love to play, we usually play at home for $.05 or $.10 a card so I can imagine what they'll say when they find out how much people have actually won. They'll be dreaming $$$ signs.

Thanks for all the info- I plan on playing atleast once on our cruise!
I'm curious why they call it the family pack and kiddie pack though. If the cards can't be split with the "family" then why is it called family pack? Because it's a family of cards or something? LOL

Karen and Andy were both there for 01/10/04 cruise on Magic. They were a lot of fun. Glenn was also with them and he is a riot. Our Jackpot grew to over $5,000 as no one won all week. Some days are more crowded than others so it really depends on weather, time etc.

Are you saying with the family pack you get six cards per game but you can't split them among your family like 3 people can each have two cards per game? Same thing with the kiddie pack - do all three cards per game have to be played by the same person?

Thought we might like to play Bingo one evening but I'm the only one who would even want to play multiple cards.

Yes, donmil723 that is exactly how it works. With three kids, me and my DM it made it a little difficult, but we bought two kiddie packs and DM sat between two DSs and they took turns playing while she held the cards and other DS and I played a pack.

I find the Bingo to be TOO expensive with winnings that just make it seem not worth it. (i.e. you are not likely to win, and if you do, it's usually about as much as the cards cost you to begin with). The only except would be going for the jackpot if it has not been won by the last day of the cruise.

While I don't remember exact dollar amounts, I seem to recall that it cost about $30 for my wife and I to get a "standard" set of cards (3 cards per round with 5 rounds). It seemed like the winner of the first couple of rounds would get $30 to $50 (basically enough to make your money back for playing). Once the winnings got higher for later rounds, the game was such that usually multiple people won and the winnings had to be split (and it seemed that each persons share was something on the order of $30 to $50). Out of about three sessions (or about 15 rounds), I think there was only about two or three times were someone won more than $100.

Of course I never won (but like I said, you go into Bingo knowing you are not likely to win). I just found $30 to be too expensive to play some games of Bingo where you know you are going to lose, and if you win, your only likely to get back about what you paid for the cards to begin with.

I much perfered the way they used to play bingo at my parents country club. At the start of the evening, cards were $1 each and good for 10 rounds. They would take a break after 5 rounds, and additional cards could be purchased for $0.50. Pots started at about $10-$15, and quickly raised to $20 -$25. I think the last round of the evening was something like $50, but could be as high as $200.

Dad would buy us one card each at the start, and two more at the half. So for a family of 4, he was spending $8 for the entire night (10 rounds of bingo last about 2 hours). If we won just one round, we at least made our money back. But even if we didn't win anything, we still had 2 hours of fun for the whole family for less than $10. On DCL, an equivilent amount of fun would cost about $120 ($30 for 2 for 5 rounds, so for a family of 4, that's $60, and you have to do it twice to get 10 rounds).

[EDIT]
In case things have changed, I should mention that when we last played Bingo on DCL, it was the year that they started offering Bingo. From what I've read here, it sounds like some changes have been made. As an example, when we played, children were NOT allowed to participate. They could be in the room, but Disney was so sturn about not allowing children to "gamble" that they would disqualify any cards handled by children.

So perhaps some changes have been made and my observations are no longer accurate. If I'm wrong, could someone let us know what a typical bingo session is like?

We played the first day of our March 6th Eastern that Bingo was offered (The Sunday I think). The payouts started around $150. It depends on how many are playing. We won around the third game and won $192 and our friends won the next game and won around $215. Now if there were more than one winner you'd have to split it.
I DO agree it is expensive but as there is no casino we spent much less than we would have on slot machines.

I actually think if they charged a bit less they'd get more people out for it but it is definitely a moneymaker for them.

I DO agree it is expensive but as there is no casino we spent much less than we would have on slot machines.

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I wish they did have a casino on board. I like playing BlackJack and usually do good enough that about break even over all.

We once shared dinner table assignments with a Disney Project Manager. He indicated the original plans called for the Prominade Lounge to be a casino. That would have been better than "another drinking spot". I do like how it is now an Internet Cafe.